December 1, 2005
04:00 AM (EST)

News Release Number: STScI-2005-37

A Giant Hubble Mosaic of the Crab Nebula

December 1, 2005: The Crab Nebula is a six-light-year-wide expanding remnant of a star's
supernova explosion. Japanese and Chinese astronomers recorded this
violent event nearly 1,000 years ago in 1054, as did, almost certainly,
Native Americans. This composite image was assembled from 24 individual
exposures taken with the NASA Hubble Space Telescope’s Wide Field and
Planetary Camera 2 in October 1999, January 2000, and December 2000.
It is one of the largest images taken by Hubble and is the highest
resolution image ever made of the entire Crab Nebula.